ill through in a vote for blofeld. you can make some really crazy ambient patches that will change and evolve over a couple minuets with just a single held chord. i got my keyboard version second hand for $600 too so you dont have to settle for the desktop...although with all that gear, maybe the desktop would be a wiser choice lol

dont rule out the ipad completely either (used ipad2 can be found fairly cheap, or is the principal?) animoog and nave are amazing, i need to use them more.

One more theoreticizing point - the so-called "free envelope generators" should be good for doing soundscapes. I see you already do have an AN1x on your list. How'bout some E-mu/Ensoniq stuff? Command stations, Morpheus/Ultraproteus; Fizmo is way over budget these days. I'd summon Balma and Aeon to this thread for better details on those.

Maybe also something from the GEM breed (S2/S3, Equinox - all have 10-stage EGs') or the Kurzweils?

M1 totally has an ambient house/ soundscape vibe going for it, but the ideal tool for the job is a nice rack sampler. Sample your synths, and go nuts with adding different layers, pitching things, etc. What's nice is you don't need big storage to do soundscapes. You can get away with relatively small loops. And if you've got one with individual outs, your mixer can become a realtime controller for morphing patches!

I'll be posting a pic soon. Promise! I'm slowly starting to understand that part of my problem is FX selection. I've spent the past 8 years focused on building up my rig that I ignored FX almost completely. I intend on buying a nicer tube preamp soon, replacing the ART FX-1 with a Lexicon rack, replacing the Behringer Vintage Time Machine with an actual Memory Man (or maybe the Minifooger delay!), replacing my distortion units with clone Shin-Ei Companion Fuzzes, Big Muffs, and ProCo Rats, ordering an Eventide Space per Stab's suggestion, and trying to find another M-Tron Phasor (or better yet, a Bi-Phase). Obviously this will take me a couple years, so I'm trying to get the important stuff out of the way first. Beyond that, I want to find a Wavestation keyboard since that seems to be the "go to" soundscapes synth, and if I can find a KB version for $600 or less, a Blofield. There's other little things that are catching my eye like the Korg Volca line, Waldorf Rocket, and DSI Mopho Desktop since they're so damn cheap on the used market. But before any of this? More three tier stands!

MFOS Sound Lab II or Sound Lab Ultimate if you can solder, and if you can't there are some already built on Ebay and Etsy. There's also the Pittsburgh Synthesizer Block for $300, Doepfer A-111-5 (Dark Energy module) for $500. And then there are all the cheap CMOS and NAND oscillators that are great for drones and soundscapes.